Go Back  Bike Forums > Bike Forums > Advocacy & Safety
Reload this Page >

Bike Safety -- How can I help?

Notices
Advocacy & Safety Cyclists should expect and demand safe accommodation on every public road, just as do all other users. Discuss your bicycle advocacy and safety concerns here.

Bike Safety -- How can I help?

Old 03-04-21, 07:16 PM
  #26  
DangerousDanR
Senior Member
 
Join Date: May 2018
Location: Fargo ND
Posts: 901

Bikes: Time Scylon, Lynskey R350, Ritchey Breakaway, Ritchey Double Switchback, Lynskey Ridgeline, ICAN Fatbike

Mentioned: 2 Post(s)
Tagged: 0 Thread(s)
Quoted: 460 Post(s)
Liked 539 Times in 302 Posts
I already have a Sprintech mirror on my road bikes and big mirrors on the tandem, so your project seems somewhat pointless. The issue is not visibility. It is human perception. Thanks to the DOT failing to understand what John Voevodsky actually was doing, we have the third brake light on cars and light trucks, which the DOT claimed reduced rear impacts by 4.3%, which I suspect (but don't know, for sure) was down in the noise.

The original Voevodsky light worked as follows:
The light, activated by the use of the brake pedal, was pulsed in a controlled fashion at a rate, duty cycle, and intensity that varied exponentially with a component of deceleration. A comparison of the experimental group (with the light for 12.3 million miles) with a control group of 160 cabs (without the light for 7.2 million miles) revealed that the light prevented 5.4 collisions, 1.02 cab driver injuries, and $643 of taxicab damage per million miles.
So, the harder you brake, the faster it flashes. The Garmin Varia sounds like it tries to improve driver perception with a variable speed flashing light.

BNBB's idea might help a little, but the real problem is the attitude of car drivers. Yes, pedestrian and cyclist death rates are increasing in the USA. As has been pointed out, the SUV driver owns much of the credit for this. I understand that in 2018 France put in place a license suspension of up to 3 years for any driver who fails to yield to a pedestrian or cyclist. We cycled in Burgundy in 2019 for about a month, and the French drivers were the best about respecting cyclists and pedestrians that I have ever seen.
DangerousDanR is offline  
Old 03-05-21, 07:10 AM
  #27  
downhillmaster
Senior Member
 
Join Date: May 2018
Posts: 1,682
Mentioned: 9 Post(s)
Tagged: 0 Thread(s)
Quoted: 980 Post(s)
Liked 776 Times in 402 Posts
Originally Posted by NB2
Our project unfortunately does not give us the capacity to provide a legal change to cycling safety and to change driver habits. With the way you all describe your problem, it sounds like an accident is not only inevitable but likely. While my group isn't the most avid cyclists on the planet, nor are we the most well-read on the topics, we do have engineering backgrounds and are capable of providing something for you all, the cyclists, that would help. We want to leverage the skills we do have to help solve the problem of rider safety. You keep saying there is nothing more the cyclist can do to be safe; I simply do not believe that. Every time you turn your head to look behind you, you lose sight of what is ahead. Would you not agree that having some sort of device to allow you to see on-coming rear traffic and how laterally close it is to you is beneficial? We have done research into the products on the market, including the Varia, SmartHalo, and CycleSight, and feel that by combining and adding to these technologies, we can ease the difficulties that are associated with vigilance.


It obviously takes a lot of effort to be constantly vigilant of your biking surroundings, what we want to do is give the cyclist a system that gives them the most complete set of information about their surroundings in a compact way to optimize the amount of time they have to react. We know this isn't completely re-regulating the driver safety laws but what we want to know is, of the things we can help with, what would you want to see? I am here to try and help you all as the cycling community, if we can't get information about what you, as a cycling community, need (other than safer drivers...) we cannot help.
Great start.
Not cyclists and not well read on the subject.
But golly gee, we are students with a bit of engineering background and we want to change the world!
And possibly even get some free help with a project we have to complete for the university
downhillmaster is offline  
Likes For downhillmaster:
Old 03-05-21, 10:02 AM
  #28  
ridelikeaturtle
Senior Member
 
ridelikeaturtle's Avatar
 
Join Date: Nov 2015
Location: Dublin, Ireland
Posts: 1,259

Bikes: Bianchi Ti Megatube; Colnago Competition; Planet-X EC-130E; Klein Pulse; Amp Research B4; Litespeed Catalyst; Trek Y11

Mentioned: 8 Post(s)
Tagged: 0 Thread(s)
Quoted: 596 Post(s)
Liked 476 Times in 258 Posts
Originally Posted by NB2
...
You keep saying there is nothing more the cyclist can do to be safe; I simply do not believe that. Every time you turn your head to look behind you, you lose sight of what is ahead. Would you not agree that having some sort of device to allow you to see on-coming rear traffic and how laterally close it is to you is beneficial? ...

It obviously takes a lot of effort to be constantly vigilant of your ... surroundings, what we want to do is give the cyclist a system that gives them the most complete set of information about their surroundings in a compact way to optimize the amount of time they have to react. ...
Alternate storyline:
You keep saying there is nothing more women can do to be safe; I simply do not believe that. Every time you turn your head to look behind you, you lose sight of what is ahead. Would you not agree that having some sort of device to allow you to see on-coming attackers and how laterally close it is to you is beneficial? ...

It obviously takes a lot of effort to be constantly vigilant of your ... surroundings, what we want to do is give women a system that gives them the most complete set of information about their surroundings in a compact way to optimize the amount of time they have to react. ...

See how incorrect is your entire approach? CYCLISTS ARE NOT THE PROBLEM.
ridelikeaturtle is offline  
Old 03-05-21, 10:05 AM
  #29  
billridesbikes
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Nov 2019
Posts: 701
Mentioned: 1 Post(s)
Tagged: 0 Thread(s)
Quoted: 347 Post(s)
Liked 418 Times in 250 Posts
Originally Posted by blacknbluebikes
Here's a novel idea: create a ride-tracker in my phone that scores my rides for risk. thought is a derivative of "I keep telling my wife..." (which I never do, of course). if the app tracked me versus known road controls and then gave me positive, constructive feedback, that might be interesting. "BNBB, you can improve your stopping rate at stop signs." "BBNB, you could have a safer commute on these alternate roads with only 3 extra minutes travel time"; "The roads you took last week are 30% high traffic, 20% residential and 50% rural."; "This week you reduced your time on busy roads by 5%"; "Here are the roads near you with the highest number of BMV accidents". "BNBB, you passed thru 17 stop signs on this trip, and you stopped at 3, slowed at 11 and completely blew through 3 of them." Just an idea. If we can't tweak the bad drivers, maybe we can still help cyclists consider different habits.
I recently discovered this web site: Bikemaps.org
which is a crowdsourced tool for bicycle safely.
What would fit blacknbluebikes idea is a web site where you submit a gxp route file and it would use the aggregated data from bikemaps to return a route that has warnings for high risk intersections or ‘scored’ the route as suggested based on reported incidents. You can then load the modified file to your bike computer and warnings would pop up or give you an audible as you approached higher risk spots.
billridesbikes is offline  
Likes For billridesbikes:
Old 03-05-21, 11:26 AM
  #30  
livedarklions
Tragically Ignorant
 
livedarklions's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jun 2018
Location: New England
Posts: 15,613

Bikes: Serotta Atlanta; 1994 Specialized Allez Pro; Giant OCR A1; SOMA Double Cross Disc; 2022 Allez Elite mit der SRAM

Mentioned: 62 Post(s)
Tagged: 0 Thread(s)
Quoted: 8186 Post(s)
Liked 9,094 Times in 5,053 Posts
Originally Posted by blacknbluebikes
Here's a novel idea: create a ride-tracker in my phone that scores my rides for risk. thought is a derivative of "I keep telling my wife..." (which I never do, of course). if the app tracked me versus known road controls and then gave me positive, constructive feedback, that might be interesting. "BNBB, you can improve your stopping rate at stop signs." "BBNB, you could have a safer commute on these alternate roads with only 3 extra minutes travel time"; "The roads you took last week are 30% high traffic, 20% residential and 50% rural."; "This week you reduced your time on busy roads by 5%"; "Here are the roads near you with the highest number of BMV accidents". "BNBB, you passed thru 17 stop signs on this trip, and you stopped at 3, slowed at 11 and completely blew through 3 of them." Just an idea. If we can't tweak the bad drivers, maybe we can still help cyclists consider different habits.

Any idea what data base the stats would be drawn from? Serious question, not intended as snark.
livedarklions is offline  
Old 03-05-21, 11:30 AM
  #31  
livedarklions
Tragically Ignorant
 
livedarklions's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jun 2018
Location: New England
Posts: 15,613

Bikes: Serotta Atlanta; 1994 Specialized Allez Pro; Giant OCR A1; SOMA Double Cross Disc; 2022 Allez Elite mit der SRAM

Mentioned: 62 Post(s)
Tagged: 0 Thread(s)
Quoted: 8186 Post(s)
Liked 9,094 Times in 5,053 Posts
Originally Posted by NB2
Hello,

I am a university student trying to help with rider safety by developing a product. Current needs my team is trying to solve are rear object detection and warning, health tracking, GPS, on-bike messaging, and rider visibility through lighting. We would love to learn about more issues riders are having so that we can meet the existing needs.

With that said, what do you fear when riding? What makes you feel unsafe while on your bike? How can I help?
-Nate

I want a device that makes drive thru cashiers think my bike is a car so they won't refuse me service when I ride up to the window.
livedarklions is offline  
Likes For livedarklions:
Old 03-05-21, 11:42 AM
  #32  
Pratt
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Aug 2019
Posts: 1,098
Mentioned: 1 Post(s)
Tagged: 0 Thread(s)
Quoted: 411 Post(s)
Liked 488 Times in 291 Posts
Instead of the deathly for cell phones, how about a low power transmitter like the weather warnings that would send to active cell phones a "bicyclist ahead' warning?
Pratt is offline  
Old 03-05-21, 01:58 PM
  #33  
blacknbluebikes 
Senior Member
 
blacknbluebikes's Avatar
 
Join Date: Jul 2013
Location: NJ, USA
Posts: 1,276

Bikes: two blacks, a blue and a white.

Mentioned: 2 Post(s)
Tagged: 0 Thread(s)
Quoted: 442 Post(s)
Liked 840 Times in 407 Posts
I'm guessing (underline) that these folks have that somewhere, somehow... https://www.openstreetmap.org/
blacknbluebikes is offline  
Old 03-10-21, 02:54 PM
  #34  
Korina
Happy banana slug
 
Korina's Avatar
 
Join Date: Sep 2015
Location: Arcata, California, U.S., North America, Earth, Saggitarius Arm, Milky Way
Posts: 3,753

Bikes: 1984 Araya MB 261, 1992 Specialized Rockhopper Sport, 1993 Hard Rock Ultra, 1994 Trek Multitrack 750, 1995 Trek Singletrack 930

Mentioned: 31 Post(s)
Tagged: 0 Thread(s)
Quoted: 1524 Post(s)
Liked 1,514 Times in 907 Posts
Originally Posted by NB2
Our project unfortunately does not give us the capacity to provide a legal change to cycling safety and to change driver habits. With the way you all describe your problem, it sounds like an accident is not only inevitable but likely. While my group isn't the most avid cyclists on the planet, nor are we the most well-read on the topics, we do have engineering backgrounds and are capable of providing something for you all, the cyclists, that would help. We want to leverage the skills we do have to help solve the problem of rider safety. You keep saying there is nothing more the cyclist can do to be safe; I simply do not believe that. Every time you turn your head to look behind you, you lose sight of what is ahead. Would you not agree that having some sort of device to allow you to see on-coming rear traffic and how laterally close it is to you is beneficial? We have done research into the products on the market, including the Varia, SmartHalo, and CycleSight, and feel that by combining and adding to these technologies, we can ease the difficulties that are associated with vigilance.


It obviously takes a lot of effort to be constantly vigilant of your biking surroundings, what we want to do is give the cyclist a system that gives them the most complete set of information about their surroundings in a compact way to optimize the amount of time they have to react. We know this isn't completely re-regulating the driver safety laws but what we want to know is, of the things we can help with, what would you want to see? I am here to try and help you all as the cycling community, if we can't get information about what you, as a cycling community, need (other than safer drivers...) we cannot help.
It sounds like you already have something; what is it?

Also, I have just such a device; I call it a "mirror". One quick glance and I can see what's coming and where they are. I'm thinking of patenting it. (<--- sarcasm alert)
Korina is offline  
Likes For Korina:
Old 03-12-21, 08:31 PM
  #35  
drsmoooth
Newbie
 
Join Date: Mar 2021
Posts: 68
Mentioned: 0 Post(s)
Tagged: 0 Thread(s)
Quoted: 11 Post(s)
Liked 58 Times in 25 Posts
Originally Posted by NB2
Hello,

I am a university student trying to help with rider safety by developing a product. Current needs my team is trying to solve are rear object detection and warning, health tracking, GPS, on-bike messaging, and rider visibility through lighting. We would love to learn about more issues riders are having so that we can meet the existing needs.

With that said, what do you fear when riding? What makes you feel unsafe while on your bike? How can I help?
-Nate
(1) I fear getting hit by a car and (2) crashing alone as lots of my riding is alone.
For number 1, I do most of my riding, 99%, on paved and clear cycling trails. Where I live, There are miles and miles, however, I do have bright flashing lights when I have to cross the road. For number 2, I have a Specialized helmet with ANGI which will notify my contacts incase of a crash.
drsmoooth is offline  
Old 03-18-21, 10:43 AM
  #36  
acm
Senior Member
 
acm's Avatar
 
Join Date: May 2019
Location: Rochester, NY
Posts: 59

Bikes: '84 Centurion Pro Tour 15; '97 Cannondale M900

Mentioned: 0 Post(s)
Tagged: 0 Thread(s)
Quoted: 22 Post(s)
Liked 38 Times in 20 Posts
Originally Posted by NB2
Our project unfortunately does not give us the capacity to provide a legal change to cycling safety and to change driver habits. With the way you all describe your problem, it sounds like an accident is not only inevitable but likely. While my group isn't the most avid cyclists on the planet, nor are we the most well-read on the topics, we do have engineering backgrounds and are capable of providing something for you all, the cyclists, that would help. We want to leverage the skills we do have to help solve the problem of rider safety. You keep saying there is nothing more the cyclist can do to be safe; I simply do not believe that. Every time you turn your head to look behind you, you lose sight of what is ahead. Would you not agree that having some sort of device to allow you to see on-coming rear traffic and how laterally close it is to you is beneficial? We have done research into the products on the market, including the Varia, SmartHalo, and CycleSight, and feel that by combining and adding to these technologies, we can ease the difficulties that are associated with vigilance.


It obviously takes a lot of effort to be constantly vigilant of your biking surroundings, what we want to do is give the cyclist a system that gives them the most complete set of information about their surroundings in a compact way to optimize the amount of time they have to react. We know this isn't completely re-regulating the driver safety laws but what we want to know is, of the things we can help with, what would you want to see? I am here to try and help you all as the cycling community, if we can't get information about what you, as a cycling community, need (other than safer drivers...) we cannot help.

I'm afraid you're just trying to shoehorn a technocratic solution to a problem that is not caused by a lack of technology but by infrastructure, culture, politics, and human error.

The problem here is that what you want to do is put another device in front of cyclists, increasing the number of distracted road-users looking at screens when we cyclists should be **constantly** vigilant of the reality around us.

To put this more constructively, please for the love of god and all that is holy, please please please don't make it a device that is distracting to cyclists!! This will kill more people than it will save.

I cannot emphasize this enough. An auditory alarm of some kind, maybe. Do not take peoples eyes off the road.

Last edited by acm; 03-18-21 at 10:46 AM.
acm is offline  
Likes For acm:

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off


Thread Tools
Search this Thread

Contact Us - Archive - Advertising - Cookie Policy - Privacy Statement - Terms of Service -

Copyright © 2024 MH Sub I, LLC dba Internet Brands. All rights reserved. Use of this site indicates your consent to the Terms of Use.